Hordaland Kunstsenter

 

During their Collaborative Research Residency Miriam Fumarola, Marti Manen andKatarina Stenkvist will research possibilities for new ways of approaching gender and representation within the art institution. They wish to formulate practical and working methods by studying how various forms of discriminatory power structures interact, thus applying an intersectional perspective. As guest they have invited Olav Fumarola Unsgaard.

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Marti Manen (1976, Barcelona, lives and works in Stockholm, curator) is currently co-curator for the Turku Biennal 2011 in Finland. His latest exhibitions have been History is nothing more than a number of small things arranged in a particular disorder (Instituto Cervantes, Stockholm & Espai Zero1, Olot, 2009), From / To Mexico City (Instituto Cervantes, Stockholm & Paris, 2008) and Home Cinema (Maribel Lopez Gallery, Berlin, 2008). Manen lectures on art and globalisation at the University in Barcelona, and has also lectured at the Whitechapel Gallery, Palais de Tokyo och Musac, as well as written art critisism for the Spanish journals Exit och A*Desk.

Katarina Stenkvist (1981, lives and works in Stockholm, gender researcher) works as project manager at RFSL (The Swedish Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights) Stockholm. She has studied social anthropology at the universities of Gothenburg and Stockholm, and gender studies at Södertörn University where she majored in how transgenders are included in the Swedish discrimination legislation. Her interests are ueer theory and post-colonial studies, and she organised Feministiskt Forum (feminist Forum) in Gothenborg 2005 and 2006.

Miriam Fumarola (1979, lives and works in Gothenburg) is coordinator at the design department of the School of Design and Craft (HDK), University of Gothenbur. She has previously worked with the craft department also at HDK and in Konsthandverkscentrum (The Craft Center), an advocacy group for professional crafts makers in Sweden. Fumarola also holds practical and strategic experience with equal opportunity work as director of the organisation Swedish Agency for Equal Opportunity.

Olav Fumarola Unsgaard (1973, lives and works in Gothenburg) is a cultural reporter and editor-in-cheif of the Swedish journal of social issues Arena, and has a background from different capacities within culture, society and organsiations. He has worked with culture and questions of globalisation within the organisation Nätverkstan kultur i väst, an independent cultural organisation in Gothenburg. He is director of the board of the organisation for magazines Fronesis, on the board of the cultural journal Ord&Bild (Word&Image) and active in Attac Sweden and Ordfront, an association committed to the issues of democracy and human rights. 

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Research proposal:

Sustainable and long-term thinking on gender issues is not just about counting the number of men and women and works made by men and women. This is only the beginning and too many institutions get stuck there. The questions will often revolve around how many male or female artists who have exhibited within an institution and how gender is represented among those working within the institution. We believe that issues of gender, class and ethnicity could define a path to thinking about new ways of working, and eventually create new formats in the institutional field. To integrate an intersectional perspective in the art and institutional process is possible and different currently existing institutions in the world can act as role models in such work.

With our collaboration we want to research the institutions currently working on these issues, and that go beyond the figures a head count gives and let the analysis influence our approach. In our process we want to study a number of institutions, such as art galleries, museums and arts colleges, which have taken gender thinking one step further. We want to interview representatives from institutions and possibly even individual artists who work with gender not just "because", but because it results in more interesting exhibitions, more stimulating conversation, less prejudice. We have in different ways during our work in recent years found a few such interesting institutions. With this project we want to do a more thorough analysis and find more "best practice examples", which can serve as role models both in terms of work, approach and method.

Our view is that this research process will help us to define a map of good models within this field. From this map, we want to explore the opportunities to develop a method for working with art institutions who are interested in develop while focusing on issues of gender and intersectionality. This may involve a process-oriented workshop for institution staff. Or a more open format, like a conversational model which can be adapted to specific exhibitions. The important thing for us is that our research leads us to find more practical and effective methods for this work. We want the result of our work to be applicable, and contribute to methodological development in this area.

In our research and development of models, we will focus on the institutional level for a variety of reasons. Of course our common experience and skills comes from working at the institutional level, but we also believe that this is where change must happen. Our experience tells us that an individual artist can work with gender issues, a curator may have a gender perspective in an exhibition project, art workers may have a personal interest in gender issues, but it is at the institutional level that the entire structure may be affected. This is where we believe we can contribute to developing new methods and finding ways to strengthen art galleries, museums as well as education.

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The Collaborative Research Residency is the joint effort of BAC, Baltic Art Center in Visby, Sweden; The Factory of Art and Design (FFKD) in Copenhagen, Denmark and Hordaland Art Centre in Bergen, Norway where we offer one month residencies  for research groups of three collaborators where at least one has a contemporary visual arts background (artist/curator/art critic). The programme encourages new relationships and should be seen as a chance to try out different types of collaborations, which may have an inter-disciplinary character.

THE HOSTS

Baltic Art Center is a production office and work place for artists, curators and contemporary art writers located at the Swedish island Gotland. BAC runs a variety of different production- and residency programs. It is a flexible organization placing the artistic process at the centre of its activities it therefore has no permanent studios or exhibition rooms. BAC is working actively with questions concerning the relationship between artistic process, institution and society with the aim to continuously assess and re-think our working methods.

The Factory of Art and Design (FFKD) is an artist-run institution in Copenhagen, Denmark. FFKD houses 55 studios for professional visual artists and designers and a 1000m2 production hall, which is used for exhibitions and events. We run a variety of different international residency programs and collaborate equally on a local, national and international level in issues dealing with the conditions of artistic production.

Hordaland Art Centre based in Bergen, Norway was established 1976 as the first artist run art centre in Norway. Its activities are based around the exhibition programme with equal emphasis on seminars, presentations and dialogue. Since 1985 Hordaland Art Centre has had a residency programme, from 2008 open to international artist, curators, writers and other art professionals. Hordaland Art Centre is situated in one of the oldest remaining school buildings in Bergen where we focus on local commitment in an international every day.